Volume 9, No 2, Fall 2014 ISSN 1932-1066

Into the Wild (West): Philosophy and Cinematic Mythmaking Shai Biderman Tel Aviv University, Israel [email protected]

Abstract: Two recent monographs that demonstrate the power of philosophical engagement with cinematic and the cinematic capacity for mythmaking, Hollywood Westerns and American Myth and Ride, Boldly Ride, are here argued to make an innovative contribution to the view that film is "philosophy in action," and that the American is a crucial in which to see this at work. They do so by arguing both that philosophical practice can find a relevant object in this cinematic genre, and that the Western as a cinematic genre makes unique contributions to philosophical practice. Kevin Stoehr and Robert Pippin show that by raising questions of identity, self-manifestation, and the affirmation of existence, Westerns present us with an innovative form of philosophical scrutiny that reveals how the audience understands itself and creates a philosophical presentation of the American myth.

Keywords: Cavell, Stanley; film as philosophy; myth; cinematic genre; of remarriage.

The cinematic genre of American Westerns has long yet differently organized, expand on similar thematic been the focus of interdisciplinary interest. While grounds, which, as such, sets them apart from other usually fulfilling the scholarly passion of film-scholars, more traditional works in philosophy of film. These historians, and social scientists, the recent emergence works share the somewhat subversive understanding of a philosophical engagement with the Western genre according to which any philosophy of the Western genre deserves renewed attention. For what, if anything, does is, at the same time, a philosophy manifested by the philosophy have to say about the cinematic genre of Western genre. In other words, it is the cinematic genre the Westerns? What is it about this genre that begs for a itself—as a cinematic phenomenon of certain attributes philosophical handling, beyond the mere obviousness and qualities—that philosophizes its various contents. of text-analysis, the re-affirmation of philosophical The genre is not merely a subject matter in the hand arguments and cultural values, or the re-articulation of an inquisitive philosopher, but an active force—an (through an illustrative test case) of one film theory or aggregation of motions, images, camera angles, various another? shot types, landscapes, settings and narratological These questions are answered, in a most intriguing and innovative way, in two recently published monographs.1 These publications, equally captivating Political Philosophy, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2010 [henceforth cited as HW]; and Mary Lea Bandy and Kevin L. Stoehr, Ride, Boldly Ride: The Evolution of the 1 Robert B. Pippin, Hollywood Westerns and American American Western, Berkeley, CA: University of California Myth: The Importance of and John Ford for Press, 2012. [Henceforth cited as RBR]

Shai Biderman, "Into the Wild (West): Philosophy and Cinematic Mythmaking," Existenz 9/2 (2014), 45-49 First posted 11-28-2014 46 Shai Biderman tropes—which, as such, create an aesthetically formed In the case of cinematic genres, the idea of cinema stance, to be comprehended philosophically. exhibiting a new brand of thinking provokes a "shock Triggered by Stephen Mulhall's controversial to thought" (as Gilles Deleuze, a founding father of film- phrase according to which film is (or can be) "philosophy philosophy, puts it),4 as the unique powers of genre-qua- in action,"2 the idea that cinema (or a cinematic genre), by genre has often been overlooked or underappreciated. nature of its predisposed attributes and artistic oeuvre, So far, the philosophical engagement with cinematic can exhibit thinking on its own course, has captured the genres as such resided primarily to questions like attention of film scholars, filmmakers, and philosophers those that enquire after the ontology of the genre, the alike. This idea has become theoretical reality in the classificatory nature of genre or genres, the idea of contemporary emergence of film-philosophy. As a hybrid genres, the conditions of genre, and the role of challenge to the hegemony of grand theory and to the viewer's expectations in the articulation of genres. With superiority of verbal (descriptive) discourse of analytic , an Anglo-American counterpart of philosophy, film-philosophy rejects the asymmetric Deleuze, the idea of genre as a medium—namely, the relations embedded in "the philosophy of X" paradigm. idea of genre as an independent and autonomous mode This paradigm, to quote Robert Sinnerbrink, is of contemplation in the realm of cinema—has taken that according to which "philosophy conceptually center stage in contemporary debate.5 A genre, claims analyzes and theorizes its object precisely because the Cavell, is an independent medium, which, as such, latter cannot do so."3 Undermining this traditional conveys meaning, engages in aesthetic contemplation, misconception of art's power to philosophize, film- and exhibits a distinctive grammar. For Cavell, the sub- philosophers offer a new approach to the intersection genre of American comedy films of the 1930s and 1940s between film and philosophy, in which one is liable (which he calls "comedy of remarriage") and the genre to acknowledge an autonomous cinematic thinking, of romantic (which he tags "the melodrama existing independently without the need to be of the unknown woman") are those that exhibit the most translated into recognizable forms of philosophical engaging philosophical potential, and are therefore argumentation in order to sustain a thought. The film- predominant cases of cinematic thinking. philosophers—the holders of this new approach—thus Cavell's reasons for favoring these genres are breaks away from the traditional view of film theory, most indicative to those supporting the philosophical and, correspondingly, from the conventional way by reevaluation of the Western genre. According to which philosophy of film has been practiced. They Cavell, the comedy of remarriage recounts the coming create a thematic barricade against the traditional back together of a couple that rekindles their love questions and investigatory techniques, and present a (which has always been there) by first facing, and then new approach to the nature of film as well as to that overcoming, divorce. The female protagonist in this of philosophy. By uttering substantially different genre undergoes what William Rothman articulates as presuppositions regarding both the uniqueness of a form of a "spiritual quest." Creating herself anew, she cinema and the characteristics of the philosophical is then embraced by her renewed partnership, gaining experience, film-philosophy becomes "an alternative a mutual acknowledgment throughout the process.6 approach that combines aesthetic receptivity to film Contrarily, in the genre of melodrama, the woman seeks with philosophically informed reflection", and, as fulfillment outside marriage. Hence, the melodrama, such, is "a way of aesthetically disclosing, perhaps also which is adjacent to the comedy of remarriage, can be transforming…our experience of the modern world" seen as a mechanism of negation, undermining a theme (NPF 3). Similarly, it is a way, an incentive (one can say), for philosophy itself "to reflect upon its own limits or 4 Gilles Deleuze, Cinema 2: The Time-Image, London: even to experiment with new forms of philosophical Athlone 1989, pp. 156, 189-224. expression" (NPF 7). 5 Stanley Cavell, The World Viewed: Reflections on the Ontology of Film, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University 2 Stephen Mulhall, On Film, New York, NY: Routledge Press, 1979. 2008, p. 2. 6 William Rothman, "Cavell on Film, Television, and 3 Robert Sinnerbrink, New Philosophies of Film: Thinking Opera," in Stanley Cavell, ed. Richard Eldridge, New Images, London; New York, Continuum International York, NY: Cambridge University Press 2003, pp. 206- Pub. Group 2011, p. 7. [Henceforth cited as NPF] 38, here p. 212. http://www.existenz.us Volume 9, No. 2, Fall 2014 Into the Wild (West): Philosophy and Cinematic Mythmaking 47

"that hinges on the threats of misunderstanding and my mind, another most indicative reworking of Cavell's violence" which embody the happiness of the .7 account, as it combines and conjoins our scientific What is tellingly unique in these two genres, knowledge with our tendency towards the imaginary according to Cavell, is their shared focus on human fiction, thus reinventing the genre as a philosophical relationships and mutual acknowledgement. In quest. Consequently, the unique collision between the remarriage comedies, the "war between the sexes" is a substantially real and the imaginary fiction makes the struggle for mutual recognition. The female protagonist Sci-Fi , according to Vivian Sobchack, the takes on a quest of self-identity, which begins by her best cinematic candidate to emphasize the "actual, "thinking of her own existence," then "announcing of extrapolative or speculative science and the empirical her cogito ergo sum," and finally, moving from "haunting method" (SS 53). As such, this genre symbolizes "the the world to existing in it." Complementarily, in the radical alteration of our cultures' temporal and spatial "melodrama of the unknown woman," this quest takes consciousness" (SS 223), and for that reason, Daniel a less comic, and somewhat more precarious, form. Shaw considers it "the most philosophical of…genres."13 However so, these minute differences are nevertheless As the main argument regarding the thinking underlined by the goal that both genres share, namely, powers of a cinematic genre is explored, we can now the unveiling and acknowledgment of the "power turn to a newly added item to this list of philosophical of transfiguration," as expressed in the woman's genres, namely, the American Western. In light of the suffering creation (whether ending in triumph, as in previously discussed ways by which philosophers the comedies, or not, as in the .) As it were, have explored their selected genres, it is reasonable to the focal point of the narrative of both these genres is ask what possibly could be the philosophical output of the intense playing out of the relationship between an Westerns? In other words, what is being philosophized individual and a privileged other. This, for Cavell, is the within the Western genre? The most extensive answer— most suited setting to accommodate the condition of as offered by Pippin and Stoehr—maintains a Cavellian philosophical skepticism, as it exposes the protagonists notion of self-expression, self-acknowledgment, and (and, correlatively, the viewers) to questions of identity, skepticism. However, instead of the female protagonist self-manifestation and the affirmation of existence.8 (which takes center stage in Cavell's analysis), it is Following Cavell, also other writers have proposed the social domain, the political coming-to-be, and a similar attempt to engage the cinematic genre as a the birth of a nation, which occupies the analysis of work of philosophy, albeit in a different selection of Westerns. Much like the previously discussed genres, cinematic genres and a different scope of philosophical also Westerns predominantly philosophize human content. Such is the case with discussions of the horror relationships and mutual acknowledgement. They genre, for example by Noel Carroll,9 Cynthia Freeland,10 dwell in questions of identity, self-manifestation, and and Julian Hanich,11 or engagement with the Sci-fi the affirmation of existence. They present us with an genre, for example by Vivian Sobchack.12 The latter is, in innovative philosophical scrutiny, which unveils the way this genre thinks its subject matters, and creates 7 Stanley Cavell, Contesting Tears: The Hollywood (as can be extracted from the title of Pippin's book) a Melodrama of the Unknown Woman, Chicago, IL: philosophical presentation of the American myth. University of Chicago Press 1996, p. 5. This latter point calls for further discussion. As 8 Stanley Cavell, In Quest of the Ordinary: Lines of noted, both books treat the Western genre as a work Skepticism and Romanticism, Chicago, IL: University of of cinematic philosophy. In addition, in both books Chicago Press, 1988. the cinematic thinking in question is understood as a 9 Noel Carroll, The Philosophy of Horror, or, Paradoxes of practice of mythologizing the American identity. The the Heart, New York, NY: Routledge, 1990. idea of myth (as a culturally introspective form of 10 Cynthia A. Freeland, "Realist Horror," in Philosophy storytelling) is, by itself, an important philosophical and Film, eds. Cynthia A. Freeland and Thomas E. recognition of the genre's merits. The famous lines Wartenberg. New York, NY: Routledge 1995, pp. 126-42. 11 Julian Hanich, Cinematic Emotion in Horror Films and , New York, NY: Ungar Publishing, Thrillers: The Aesthetic Paradox of Pleasurable Fear, New 1993. [Henceforth cited as SS] York, NY: Routledge, 2010. 13 Daniel Shaw, Film and Philosophy: Taking Movies Seriously, 12 Vivian C. Sobchack, Screening Space: The American London & New York: Wallflower Press 2008, p. 44.

Existenz: An International Journal in Philosophy, Religion, Politics, and the Arts 48 Shai Biderman from The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (John Ford, philosophical mirror of existential thought,' a liberation 1962), which states, "This is the West. When the legend from excessive abstraction and objectivism, a primal, becomes the fact, print the legend," presides in both original, and essential form of truth."16 As such, their books, and is taken to be indicative to the philosophical respective monographs should not merely be read tone of the Western genre. As Richard Slotkin wisely as a progressive work of film-philosophy, but also as remarks, "myth is not only something given but profound attempts to disperse the cloud hanging over something made, a product of human labor, one of the American mythology. tools with which human beings do the work of making However, and despite commonalities, each author culture and society."14 Recall Irving Singer, whose book applies a different strategy in order to accomplish this Cinematic Mythmaking understands films in general as task. For Stoehr, it is the extensive typological effort "the definitive mythmaking art of the modern age," that of classifying (and re-classifying) the Western genre, is at once philosophical, poetic, and aesthetic. Following which fulfills the task. The typology he offers spans this, one can state that it is not that film does not simply nicely over historical perspectives and thematically rehearse mythical narratives or cultural tropes, but contextual ones. Historically analyzed, Stoehr classifies is in fact a form of argument combining the aesthetic the Westerns of Hollywood's silent era, the Westerns (the visual, the sonic, and the technological) with the of the 1930s, and the postwar psychological Westerns mythic, in order to foster what Singer refers to as "the of the late 1940s and early 1950s, as predominant transmittance of mythic themes"15 into a cohesive work archetypes of the genre. Once switching perspectives, of philosophical interpretation. Stoehr extends his typology by adding the typical The mythmaking capacity of cinema—or, mannerisms of the comic Western and the serene (yet following Singer, "the cinematic ability to elicit an self-reflective) look of the existential Western to the list attitude of imaginative receptivity in its viewers of genre archetypes. While switching between these two towards narrative scenarios that are implicitly mythic or perspectives, Stoehr also supplies a fair analysis of the include mythic elements"(CM 10)—is evidently central genre's masterpieces, for example Stagecoach, Red River, to the understanding of the Western genre prompted The Searchers, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. by Pippin and Stoehr. For Pippin—whose book, I dare These films (which are, by far, the most iconic, say, should have been titled "Hollywood Westerns as well-known and most quoted prototypes of the genre) American Myth" instead of "Hollywood Westerns and lose their exemplary role, and become the anchor for American Myth"—the Westerns are the primary way a new structure and thematic strategy, in Pippin's by which American society remembers or mythologizes monograph. In contrast with Stoehr's extensive survey, its founding (HW 20). Meanwhile, as Stoehr points out, Pippin employs a more rigid (and definitely thinner) the mythical role of the Western genre is amplified in strategy, focusing solely on these four films and their the distinction it creates "between the factual truths iconic creators (Howard Hawks and John Ford). Despite of history and the ways in which those 'truths' have impression, this scantiness should not minimize the become conveyed in narrative form" (RBR 6). As such, efficacy of the project. On the contrary; this somewhat the Western film helps to tell a story, usually more than slimmer, and definitely shorter approach to the genre is, a merely superficial one, about what it means to be and in a way, a more attuned to emphasize the mythical role what it took to become an American. (and, accordingly, the philosophical significance) of the For both Stoehr and Pippin, this mythical subtext genre as a whole. In other words, it is not the genre itself places the Western genre within the thematic role of which captures Pippin's attention, but its fundamental the cinematic capacity to philosophize its contents. role in a larger project, namely, that which maps the Both adopt the premise—nicely phrased by Kathryn cinematic construction of American identity. In this Morgan—according to which myth, as such, "is a 'pre- light, one should read Pippin's work on the Western genre as a sort of prelude to his later monograph, published in 2012, which engages another distinctively 14 Richard Slotkin, Gunfighter Nation: The Myth of the American cinematic genre: the . Both halves Frontier in Twentieth-Century America, New York, NY: HarperCollins 1993, p. 654. 15 Irving Singer, Cinematic Mythmaking: Philosophy in Film, 16 Kathryn Morgan, Myth and Philosophy From the Cambridge, MA: MIT Press 2008, p. 9. [Henceforth Presocratics to Plato, Cambridge, MA: Cambridge cited as CM] University Press 2000, p. 1. http://www.existenz.us Volume 9, No. 2, Fall 2014 Into the Wild (West): Philosophy and Cinematic Mythmaking 49 of this greater project are similarly structured, as they A similar disposition toward cinematic thinking are both restricted to the iconic (as exemplified in the and the concept of cinematic genre is also found in genre's masterpieces). In his film noir undertaking, Pippin's book when he suggests that Westerns are not Pippin analyzes four masterpieces of the genre.17 Here simply artistic illustrations of days past, but, in fact, too, he has an objective in mind, which stems clearly philosophical demonstrations of "the psychological from the title: to explore and present the fatalism within dimensions of American modernization" (HW 14), American mythology, via film noir as an instance of namely, the artistic manifestation and recreation of the cinematic philosophy. historical ideal of American's founding. For Pippin, For Stoehr, his current work is written in light philosophy, independent of the examples that inform of his previously stated position, according to which our intuitions, is "ill-equipped on its own to answer a philosophers of film should relinquish their "almost question about the true content of an historical ideal," obsessive concern" with conservative structures of and so we need a "more promising path" to unveil the philosophical argumentation, and should instead nature and essence of such ideal, and the philosophical focus on the dialectical and pluralistic nature of what comprehension thereof.20 Such a path can be formed should be experienced as "cinematic argumentation." through reflection on novels, drama, poetry, painting, Stoehr calls for a renewed reception of the cinematic and film. The American Western yields such reflection, phenomenon as an aesthetic form of Socratic (or aporetic) and thus legitimates its relevance as an essential philosophical experience.18 Elsewhere, Stoehr argues component to the overall argument. that in order to fully appreciate cinematic thinking we More specifically, Pippin argues that the Western should go beyond the debilitating constrains of film genre—viewed particularly through the classic films theory—whether "formative, realist, psychoanalytic, Stagecoach, Red River, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, [or] semiotic"—and so unveil the truly cinematic ways and The Searchers—essentially, not incidentally, recreate by which "movies generate truth and meaning."19 "the first-personal dimension of political experience" Following these claims, and in the course of offering "a (HW 15), and thus raises "the question of the political renewed appreciation of the American Western movie actuality within which political philosophy would as a form of cinematic art and as a well-established have a point" (HW 16). As such, films, in general, are cinematic genre," Ride, Boldly Ride meets this objective themselves philosophical works—aesthetic instances for cinematic argumentation. of philosophical value, importance, and significance— insofar as they "represent the fundamental problems of the human condition" (HW 17). Westerns, in 17 Robert B. Pippin, Fatalism in American Film Noir: Some Cinematic Philosophy, Charlottesville, University of particular, philosophize insofar as they create, re- Virginia Press, 2012. create, deconstruct, and reconstruct American political psychology—namely, the myth of American identity. 18 Kevin L. Stoehr, "'By Cinematic Means Alone': The Russell-Wartenberg-Carroll Debate," Film and Philosophy 15 (2011), 111-26, here p. 111. 19 Kevin L. Stoehr, "The Dialectical Approach to the Art of 20 Robert B. Pippin, "Philosophy Is Its Own Time the Moving Image: Hegel, Eisenstein, and Kracauer," Comprehended In Thought," Topoi: An International Film and Philosophy 10 (2006), 99-115, here p. 100. Review of Philosophy 25/1-2 (2006), 85-90, here pp. 85, 89.

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